s (that's merit badges, you know) waiting
for him when he passed his first class tests. "Begin at the beginning,"
that's what Mr. Ellsworth always said, and he says it's more important
to know the scout oath and follow it, than it is to get the eagle,
award. Connie's a good patrol leader all right; gee, nobody can say he
isn't, but he's crazy about stunts and merit badges. He always seemed
to think that that was all there was to scouting. But believe me,
there's many a girl wears a sailor hat who screams when she gets in a
boat. Anyway, I'm not going to be knocking anybody.

Well, the next day in the middle of the night--I mean the next night
early in the morning--I mean when it was just getting light, after the
night after the next day--we got to Catskill Landing, and oh, boy!
wasn't I glad! We tied the houseboat to an old pier maybe a couple of
hundred yards above the regular landing, and had a good swim and then
breakfast before we started up to camp. Mr. Ellsworth let Skinny go in,
but he told him to be careful not to disobey his leaders or he'd have
to come out.

Jimmy, it was funny to see that kid. I don't know how to tell you about
it, but he seemed to kind of swim different from the other fellows, and
he couldn't help getting excited. They threw pieces of stick for him to
get, and he would swim out and bring them in in his mouth just like a
dog, and then wait for more, all anxious like. One thing about Skinny I
noticed, and that was that all the fellows, even in his own patrol, got
a lot of fun out of him, making him do things, but nobody exactly
seemed to make friends with him. Anyway, I guess he didn't care, he was
always so crazy about what he was doing. Even a lot of summer people
stood around on the shore, watching him in the water and saying he was
a wonder. I guess they didn't know what to do with themselves, hey?
Mostly that's the way it is with summer people.

I flopped some flapjacks for breakfast and El Sawyer (he's a Raven)
hung one of them around his neck for a souvenir. He's a fresh kid.
Maybe you think it's easy to flop flapjacks--I should worry.

Oh, boy, now comes the best part of this whole story. As soon as we
could get our stuff into the duffel bags and the boat all tied fast, we
started out on our hike for Temple Camp. You can bet I always like to
hike, but early in the morning, oh, it's simply great. Some fellows can
drink sodas early in the morning but I can't, but anyway, early hikes